You and Yours, Mine and Ours
by RoseGabriel
Summary: Through the borough clash of 1897, through the newsie strike of 1899, through the last years of his newsie career, Spot Conlon kept his affair with Charlotte Wright a secret. Now, a newsie no more, as he finds himself quickly climbing the chain of command under crime boss Louis Amato, Spot also discovers that it's increasingly more difficult to keep Charlotte in the shadows.
1. Chapter 1

Charlotte sat at a table in a front window of the Polish bakery polishing spoons. It was 9:30 and the doors had been locked by Mr. Symanski on his way out, but his wife, Alina, could still be heard straightening the kitchen. It's true that it would not have been considered customary for a man to leave his wife to walk home alone, let alone in the dark, but as the Symanskis lived in the building next door to the shop, they seemed both to have decided at some point that it would be acceptable to make an exception. Charlotte had a rag balled tightly in her hand and rubbed at a smudge impatiently. She'd been over the spoons two or three times already but didn't feel comfortable leaving before Alina did. From where she was sitting, glowing in the window, she could see a thin line of smoke curling up from under the awning of the shop across the street. In the shadows, he'd be leaning against the storefront—the same faded checkered shirt, the red suspenders hanging down at his sides, a gold-tipped can slung through one belt loop. He would appear calm—leisurely, even—but his eyes would be too tight and he'd flick the embers away with too much force.

Alina stuck her head out of the kitchen door and wished Charlotte a good night with the typical amount of steel in her voice.

"Don't forget to lock the back door behind you," she warned as she did every night.

"I won't, Mrs. Symanski. I'll see you tomorrow. Have a nice night," Charlotte answered, keeping her voice intentionally light as one thumb ground more vigorously into the innocent spoon in her hand. Alina's boots clipped across the warn wooden floor of the kitchen, the Charlotte heard her pause to straighten something in the pantry as she passed through and stepped out the back door.

As soon as she heard the rear door close, Charlotte stood—toppling her chair backwards—and scooped all the spoons into their velvet-lined case. Stringing the cleaning rag hastily through the waistband of her apron, she righted the tipped chair and made her way to the kitchen, turning down lamps as she went. She pushed the box of spoons onto the top shelf of the pantry, that nearest the door, and walked out into the dark alleyway behind the shop with the cleaning rag still tucked in her waistband and her apron still tied behind her. Charlotte paused and bent to lock the door with the key tied around her neck, then her boots were loud on the cobblestone as she made her way out of the alley and into the road, the still road, past him leaning against the storefront, passed him without looking his way, and kept on down the sidewalk toward her tenement.

She crossed the doorway of an open bar, light and music spilling out under her feet, and ignored the voices and the clink of glasses. She turned into a more inhabited part of town and passed the vaudeville theater where men would be crowded into their seats to see the Swedish Meadowlark. She crossed to her building and opened the door, walking through a lobby strung with laundry lines heavy with hanging clothes and cluttered with stray newspaper pages crumpled underfoot. She mounted the creaky wooden stairs, avoiding the worst boards, and climbed to the sixth floor where she let herself into her apartment and lit the lamp before pulling the curtains closed.

Charlotte seated herself at the table in the middle of what was a very small room and waited with her back to the door. If she held her breath and sat very still, she could hear the stairs groan and a pair of boots scuff across the landing to stop at her door. It was quiet, then the door brushed open and closed again and she felt him and smelled him in the room with her—stale tobacco, sweat, but at least not booze. On days he'd been at the docks, he'd smell so strongly of fish and saltwater that Charlotte would hang his clothes out the window to keep the entire room from smelling like a fish market. In the old days, there was the coppery scent of newsprint mixed in, too, and his hands—black with ink—would stain her white shirt so that she'd be up late scrubbing it before work the next morning. But he didn't sell papers anymore.

He leaned down and reached around her to set a pint of whiskey on the table in front of her, a brown paper bag clinging to the sides and mouth of the bottle.

"I thought you weren't going to drink so much anymore," she breathed.

He kissed her cheek and inhaled deeply.

"Didn' take," he said lowly in her ear. "Fact, I'm still blind drunk from last night."

Charlotte knew he was just teasing her. She could always tell from the way his footsteps fell whether he was drunk or not and tonight he was not drunk. The night before, though, he had been. He stepped around the table and began to empty his pockets onto its surface—first the cane came unslung from his belt loop, then his slingshot and brass knuckles clattered to the table, along with all the change in his pocket. He lifted the cabbie hat from his head and ran a hand through his hair, which was dirty and getting longer, hanging to his chin. His suspenders already slung down from his shoulders, he tugged his shirt up from his pants and began to unbutton it from the top, stepping out of his boots and kicking them against the leg of the table.

"Did anyone follow you?" Charlotte asked, unmoving from her chair.

"Nobody ever does, Doll," he answered, turning to face her while he undressed, his eyes light. His shirt was too big on him, bigger even than it had been the month before, and Charlotte worried.

"We can't keep going like this. It's getting to you. I can see it."

"Nothin gets ta me. Don worry bout me," he answered, now bare from the waist up and unbuttoning his pants.

"You've lost more weight," she argued.

"You sayin I don look good?" he teased.

"I don't see how you can be like this about it." Her voice was tight and she'd crossed her arms on the tabletop. He was down to his long johns now, tight from navel to knees, and he stood loosely with his arms away from his sides.

"Why we gotta do dis right now, uh? C'mon, Char."

She looked at him hard and didn't answer. He crossed back over to her and pulled her to her feet. Then he took her face in his hands—not so much tender as intentional—and stooped down so that his eyes were level with her—not some great distance as he was not a tall man, but a couple of good inches. The pads of his fingers were rough and calloused on her cheeks and he held her head uncomfortably still between them.

"I can do whadevah I want, Sweet'eart," he said firmly. "I'm Spot Conlon. I own this fucking city. If I wanna see ya, I'll see ya. Nothin nobody can do to stop it happenin."

He reached one hand up into her hair, the other keeping her chin in place, and tugged a few hairpins out, letting them fall to the floor where they clicked lightly as her hair tumbled down around her face.

"Better," he said.

He pulled the forgotten rag from her waistband and let it fall to the floor with the hairpins, then reached his arms around her waist and untied her apron, letting it crumple at her feet as well.

"Relax," he insisted. "Just be 'ere wid me and don' worry 'bout dat udder stuff."

Charlotte felt the crease in her forehead loosen and closed her eyes as Spot leaned in and kissed her neck, unhooking her shirt collar where it clasped at her hair line. He lifted one hand, then the other, and undid the two covered buttons at her wrists. She stood still while he lifted the shirt off over her head. No matter how many times they'd done this, she never got used to standing in front of him in anything less than her chin-high blouse and floor-length skirt. He was not the first man she'd slept with, but the other times had been in the dark with no traipsing around in their underwear like Spot did. He had been with a lot of women. Charlotte tried not to think about how many, but she thought that must have been why he was so comfortable with nudity. It made her feel sort of lackluster thinking that it didn't make him nervous to see her down to her corset and slip, like she was just the same as the hundreds of other women he'd seen that way.

She sat down on the bed—the thin white sheets—and let him unlace her boots then tugged her feet out of them. He followed the seam of her stockings up the back of her leg until he found the top tight around her thigh, then rolled them down over her calves and left them balled up near her shoes. Still kneeling in front of her, he tugged at the laces of her corset, her whole body lunging with the force of it, until it was loose enough to fit over her head. Charlotte took a deep breath—her favorite breath of the day was the first one without her corset on—and smiled a little in spite of herself. She watched Spot walk over to the kerosene lamp on the table and bring it to the little stool by her bed where he set it before walking around to the other side of the mattress and checking out the window before he climbed into bed next to her.

"Why did you do that?" Charlotte asked, swinging her legs up into bed. "Do you think someone followed you?"

"You tink I'd be 'ere like dis if I did?" he retorted, gesturing to his bare chest. "I wouldn't let dat 'appen, Doll. Relax."

He pulled her down next to him, facing him, and slid the straps of her slip over her shoulders and down her sides.

"Just be 'ere wid me," he said again in a low voice.

He pulled her into his chest, his hands splayed against the bare skin of her back, and breathed against her hair.


	2. Chapter 2

Truthfully, someone had followed Spot to Charlotte's apartment—Jinks, an old newsie friend, Spot's second, the only one he'd ever trusted with Charlotte—with her name, with her address, with her well-being—had slunk down the street behind Spot who was slinking behind Charlotte. He ducked into the alley across from her building—sure he could still see both her window and the front door—and lit up a cigarette. It used to be that Spot would stay with Charlotte all night and Jinks wasn't expected to stay awake, just to be nearby in case anything went wrong. Lately, though, Spot didn't stay more than a few hours and Jinks was on high alert the whole time. Their mutual boss, Louis Amato, had been leaning heavily on Spot to reveal where he often disappeared to—that he hadn't beaten the truth out of him yet was proof that he trusted him and wanted to keep him around. Or it was proof that he already knew. Jinks suspected the latter to be more likely. He'd never personally seen any of Amato's guys around, but that didn't mean anything and he knew it. That Spot hadn't come to the same conclusion was just proof that he was in way too deep with this girl.

Spot had first come to Jinks during the newsie riot of 1899. He'd given him very little information—the address of a Polish bakery, the vague description of a girl with dark hair clipped back from her face in a pearl barrette—and instructions to follow her home every night to make sure she made it all the way up to her room. Jinks had stood in that same alley for years, waiting for her window to flicker with the glow of the lamp. Despite that, he still barely knew what she looked like. On the street, in a crowd, he would know her by the way she walked but not by her face. He'd never seen it up close or before it was dark enough for the street lights to be on.

In truth, it was hard for Jinks to convince himself that he wasn't in love with this girl he didn't know anything about. He'd been her sole protector for years, present even when Spot couldn't be bothered to be there for her, and he felt a strong, strange, choking fondness for the way her skirt twisted around the tops of her boots as she walked and the swish of her hair across the middle of her back, pressing her shirt against her skin. In the morning when Spot slipped out of her building, if Jinks stood downwind, he often thought it was her he could smell lifting off Spot and reaching back to him. Spot didn't know anything about the way Jinks felt and he never would. And Jinks would never act on any of it. He'd been living in Spot's shadow—often literally—since they were kids, and his loyalty to Spot was stronger than his obsession with Charlotte.

Upstairs, Charlotte made herself heavy on Spot's chest and pretended to be asleep. Maybe if he didn't want to wake her, he'd stay the night like he'd always done before he fell in, really fell in, with Amato. She'd never met Amato but she hated him. She hated Spot coming in late with bruised cheekbones and black eyes after doing his dirty work. She hated the booze on his breath and the way he sometimes smelled like hookers just from—he assured her—being around his boss.

His chest was cold under her cheek and she rubbed her hand across his skin to warm it.

"Mmmm," he murmured, and kissed the top of her head. His arm—the one tight around her—tightened more.

"Don't go," Charlotte whispered sleepily, tucking her head up under his chin. "I don't want to sleep without you."

"You know I gotta go, Angel. I got woik ta do."

"Stay," she persisted, "just this one night."

Spot tucked one hand under her arm and pulled her up so that their noses were touching. He parted her lips with his and kissed her, his hands twisted in her hair. Charlotte gripped at his back and returned the kiss, hoping to entice him to stay. But he broke away and leaned his forehead against hers and pressed his eyes closed and breathed hard, breathed her out of him, so that he'd be able to leave.

"What do we do?" she asked.

"What we've always done. We been doin like dis fer years an it ain't never been no problem."

"Maybe it's never been a problem for one of us," she disagreed.

"C'mon, you understood. I had a reputation ta maintain an dat never included settlin down wid a nice, tidy goil. Spot Conlon ain't da committed type."

Charlotte pushed herself up to a sitting position and pulled her knees up to her chest, tucking the sheet around herself to keep warm.

"An you," Spot persisted, sitting up next to her, "had a reputation, too, as a good, nice, pure, baker's assistant who didn spend her nights lockin legs wid da likes a me. Do' you did pick preddy well if ya ask me." He bumped her should with his.

"Yes," Charlotte answered. "Fine. I got to keep my job and you got to keep screwing half of New York."

"Dat ain't fair."

"No, it wasn't. I don't know why I ever let you keep coming here, then or now."

She got up and pulled her nightgown on from where it lay draped over the plain wooden chair at the foot of the bed, then wrapped herself in her robe and made for the window and the fire escape. Spot's hand gripped the top of her arm and he yanked her back from the curtain.

"Stay away from da window," he ordered. He got out of bed and pressed up against her from behind, forcing her to him with his arms around hers.

"Don' pull dis. Not tonight. I don wanna talk about dis shit anymore. 'Should' or 'shouldn' ave, it don matter. Ya did. I did. We are. If you don wanna see me den fine. It'd make my life a hella lot easier, not sneakin around like dis."

Charlotte glared straight ahead and waited for him to release her before shoving angrily away and taking three steps back from him. They stood facing one another in silence and in the dark. Next door, someone coughed in his sleep. Below them, the murmur of voices sounded over a phonograph. Spots hair hung limp to his jawline in the gray light, his shoulders slumped forward and his chest rising and falling with intentional consistency. Charlotte's eyes trailed over his sharp forehead and tight chin and the slash of his nose in a thin face and she found his eyes again, blue even in the dark, and she saw them soften as hers did the same. She took one step back toward him and reached for his hand.

"Stay," she said wearily, and her face was pained. Spot touched her chin with his thumb, her nose, brushed it over her eyelids and trailed it down her cheek and settled a hand behind her ear.

"I can't stay, Angel. You know dat."

She nodded and pinned his hand between her cheek and shoulder.

"Touch me again," she whispered. He slid his hands under the open folds of her robe and pushed it from her shoulders, then pressed his fingertips to her back through the thin material of her nightgown.

"I dunno if I can come tomorrow," he said. The way he was looking at her—all business, all Spot Conlon—she didn't object. She nodded. His hands dropped and he reached to pull on his pants.

"Just don't bother coming back. I can't do this anymore," she said halfheartedly. He grinned at her in the dark.

"I know you don' mean dat, Baby. Ya never do." He gripped her by her thighs and dragged her toward him, pressing hard against her.

"I'm too good," he rasped in her ear. "You'd never turn Spot Conlon away."


	3. Chapter 3

Charlotte was late to work the next day after searching just a minute too long for one of her stockings, which she'd found in a tiny, gauzy ball under the sheets at the foot of the bed. She arrived breathlessly at the front door as Mr. Symanski was unlocking it.

"You are late, Charlotte," he said. "And we have a busy day ahead of us."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Symanski," she offered, backing into the kitchen as she tied her apron on. Alina already had the countertops dusted with flour and was rolling out the dough for Pączki, something like a donut which sold well in the mornings. Charlotte smiled apologetically and began working on their popular poppy seed rolls. Alina glared at her and pushed more forcefully into the dough.

"You smell like a man, Charlotte," she spat in her thick accent.

"I let a neighbor hang his clothes up with mine," she stammered without looking up as she turned dough with her hands in one of the large ceramic bowls, her sleeves rolled up past her elbows. Alina had stopped what she was doing and stood with her eyes narrowed and the rolling pin pressed against her hip where flour spattered down her black skirt.

"Careful," she warned in a low voice. "Nice girls do not smell like men. And only nice girls work in bakery."

Charlotte didn't answer. She was thankful when Mr. Symanski came in and removed a pan of biscuits from the oven.

"I need you to work late tonight, Charlotte," he said, and her stomach sank. Spot had said he wasn't sure he'd be able to get away that night, but he could usually stop by in the early morning hours if nothing else. Sometimes she fell asleep alone and woke up to him snoring lightly beside her.

"There's a party," Mr. Symanski went on, "a very important party. Good for business."

Charlotte tilted the bowl onto its side with some effort and used her free hand to scoop the dough into a lightly-buttered loaf pan. It was not unusual for her to attend parties on the Symanski's behalf, delivering sweets and keeping them stocked throughout, her back pressed in some corner while the Rich and Famous hobnobbed around her. Sometimes she didn't mind going to people-watch and see how the other side lived. Sometimes she loathed passing sticky pastries out to pompous ingrates who looked down their long noses at her and whispered about her dress as they walked away.

Mr. Symanski had continued on and something he said caught her attention.

"Did you say 'Mr. Amato'?" she interrupted, and then handed him the loaf pan sheepishly as he scowled at her obvious lack of attention.

"Yes, try to listen, Charlotte, this is important—good for business. Louis Amato is having a party tonight and he wants our sweets. He wants lots of them—we'll be closing early today to get everything baked and then we'll have it sent over and you can meet it there at his house."

Charlotte turned quickly back to the counter and busied herself with scraping up pieces of dough. Spot had been killing himself in an attempt to keep Amato from meeting her, and now she was being sent there for work.

"He asked for you by name," Alina burst out, pushing around her husband to stand in front of him with her hands on her hips. "He sent someone to our door last night and asked us to send 'Charlotte, the pretty brunette' and gave us money to dress you up like a circus monkey," she sneered. In the fear that suddenly slowed her, Charlotte couldn't react to Alina's hostility. Amato had asked for her by name. That meant he knew who she was, and she didn't know if that was because he knew about her and Spot or because he had asked about her for other reasons. To her knowledge she had never met Amato, but for the past few weeks she had noticed someone following her—the blur of him as he ducked into alleys or behind carriages—but when she'd told Spot, he had brushed it off. She needed to warn him.

"How does he know your name?" Alina was demanding. "I knew you were no good, not a good girl. You're one of his whores, aren't you?" she stabbed a finger at Charlotte so hard she staggered back into the counter.

"I don't know him," she insisted, and looked frantically to Mr. Symanski who took his wife dutifully by the shoulders and pulled her back. He spoke softly to her in Polish before she pulled away from him and stormed out to the front of the shop and the sound of the bell ringing over the door.

"I've never met him," Charlotte assured Mr. Symanski. "I don't know how he knew my name."

"Mr. Amato is a powerful man," he said, nodding. "He can get information however he wants. So we need to do this thing for him tonight. He is paying us well and it will be good for us to have him on our side. After the morning rush," he went on, "I want you to go to this dress shop." He held out a scrap of parchment paper with an address scrawled on it. "My friend, she owns this shop. Mr. Amato did give us money for you. He wants you to be well dressed." He pulled a stack of bills from his pocket and handed it to her. She stared. "You can keep what you don't spend on the dress. It's your pay for working tonight."

Charlotte helped bake and serve customers their breakfast for the next few hours with the weight of the money heavy in her dress pocket. She moved carefully, worried the bills might fall out onto the floor and she'd be unable to keep everyone from scrambling for it. Anyone who saw that much money would naturally try to get it for themselves.

Around eleven, as instructed, Charlotte hung her dusty apron up by the back door and called goodbye to Mr. Symanski and his brooding wife. She walked with one hand deep in her pocket, trying to look nonchalant but fingering the money. In the other hand, she held the scrap of parchment paper and glanced between it and street numbers as she walked. She paid close attention to those around her as she moved through the crowded streets, hoping to, by chance, glimpse Spot, but she never saw him.

As she neared the center of town where the shop was, she noticed the blue blur of a familiar shirt a few yards behind her and realized that the person who'd been tailing her for weeks was doing so now. She felt the scrap of parchment slip from her sweaty palms and caught it before it could be lost in the shuffle of feet, cramming it into her empty pocket. Staring straight ahead, she quickened her pace and moved through the bodies in the street as fluidly as she could, glancing over her shoulder surreptitiously to see if he still followed her. He didn't appear to be there, but when she came upon the dress shop suddenly on her right, she ducked in quickly and walked straight up to the woman hunched over a sewing machine.

"What do you want?" the woman asked, and Charlotte pulled a few of the limp bills out of her pocket and offered them.

"Eryk Symanski sent me," she said. "I need a dress by tonight."


	4. Chapter 4

In a starched lavender dress that brushed the top of her polished boots, with lace gripping her throat and ensnaring her wrists and tucked into the waist to billow down the front of the skirt, Charlotte teetered at a side door of Louis Amato's elaborate estate, feeling she might tip over in the breeze that blew dusk across the city. There were faux pearls clipped to her earlobes and tucked up into the coils of her hair, and a silver brooch with faux amethyst inlays was pinned at the hollow of her collarbone—these were all on loan from the woman at the dress shop, and she had strict instructions to return them to the drop box that emptied laundry parcels into the store at the conclusion of her social evening.

She had been greeted by a member of the wait staff at the back door and directed around to the side to be ushered in with the arrival of the sweets, and now she stepped back out of the road as a carriage rolled up in a coil of dust. The driver, an elderly man in a graying hat and loose tie, climbed down and passed her a couple of white paper boxes, tied around with twine. There was a young boy with him who also took some of the boxes up and went inside with them where they were led to the hallway just outside a bustling kitchen where a large gold cart on wheels waited, papered in doilies, to be stacked with treats. Charlotte set her boxes down and began with one of the maids to arrange the baked goods while the old delivery driver and the boy brought in the remainder of the boxes and took their leave.

The maid, whose name was Jane, made kind, vague small talk with her as they worked side by side, then offered to store the sweets that didn't fit on the cart in the cooler in the kitchen. When she was about to go, Charlotte touched her by the arm.

"I'm not sure why I'm here," she admitted. Her stomach was vibrating in her body and there was a walnut at the base of her throat that she struggled to swallow past. "Mr. Amato requested that I be the one to serve him at this event, but I don't even know how he knew my name."

Jane was nodding before she'd finished voicing her uncertainty. "I became employed here when Mr. Amato sent someone to my home to offer me work in his house. Before that, I worked for an industrial laundry service. I still don't know how he knew who I was, but it's not unusual for him to hire girls he notices. I wouldn't worry," she went on, seeing the fear in the way Charlotte's brow was folded. "He's not a bad man if you stay on his good side. He pays us well and treats us fairly. This is a good opportunity for you. If he likes your work tonight maybe he will ask you to stay on."

Not wanting to give away any more of her precarious situation, Charlotte just smiled weakly and nodded her thanks before watching Jane retreat into the kitchen with the white boxes stacked in her arms. She was standing in a long hallway with many doorways leading off on either side, but she still felt fairly certain she could find the room she needed if she followed the sound of voices and silverware clinking on plates. She took one shaky step forward, pushing the heavy cart ahead of her, and then another, closing the distance to the open doorway with light and laughter spilling out. Another server with drinks on a silver tray and a long white apron over her other arm stopped Charlotte and offered the apron to her.

"From Jane," she said by way of clarification. "She didn't want you to get your pretty dress dirty."

Charlotte thanked her and took the apron but slung it over the handle of the cart rather than covering up the ruffles of her pale purple skirt. She thought if Amato had given her so much money to buy such a dress that he'd want to be able to see it. With the server ahead of her now, she followed her through the doorway and into long room dominated by a heavy wooden table down the center. There were thick rugs on the floor, dark family pictures hung on the walls, and a fire blared in the fireplace. All around the room lamps had been lit and the table was covered in food. Charlotte felt herself blocking the doorway but she was terrified to walk any further. Directly opposite her, Louis Amato was leaning back in a tall-backed chair, a glass of wine in his hand.

He wore a fitted black vest over a well-pressed white shirt and a deep red cravat bloomed out of the top. A single diamond pin glittered from the center. Charlotte had seen him before—surely everyone in the city had—but had never been so close to him, his black hair slicked back tightly against his temples, his wide, angular jaw clenching and unclenching as he smiled around a mouthful of food, his brown eyes set far back in his dark, handsome face. He leaned forward and rested the glass of wine next to his plate, the movement shaking her gaze free to glance around the rest of the table, glance to his left and to his right, and lock eyes with Spot. Spot had frozen in his chair, eyes wide with terror, hair brushing down over his face. He was in a deep blue shirt she had never seen before and his red suspenders were bright and new. He didn't have a tie on but there was a jacket on the back of his chair. His arms were outstretched on the arms of the chair, steadying the girl that rocked and laughed in his lap. Charlotte could only see the loose blonde curls that hid her face and that the straps of her dress brushed loosely against her arms. She had her nose nuzzled into Spot's neck. Charlotte could see every muscle in his throat tensed as they locked eyes across the room.

And then there was a frustrated server behind her hissing for her to move forward and she was forced to move further into the cloud of smoke and the smell of whisky and turn to her right where the cart was to be stationed. Amato did not seem to have noticed her yet, and by the time Charlotte had turned her back to the corner and positioned herself next to the cart, Spot had relaxed his muscles to the point of being jelly and sat slumped lackadaisically against the back of the chair, an easy look on his face. Charlotte watched him shove the blonde up so suddenly she caught herself against the table. Thinking he was playing with her, she swatted at him and snuggled back against him. He snapped something at her and pushed her up again. Now she pouted insolently and pushed tight fists against her round hips. The skirt of her dress was pulled up on one side and tucked into the waistband, revealing a long, pale leg under the light sheen of stockings.

"What gives, Conlon?" she was demanding, and then Amato noticed and leaned into the conversation.

"Wassa matta, Spot?" he asked. He was smoking a cigar now, dangling it between the first two fingers on his left hand. "She not doin it for ya?" He grabbed the girls' arm and pulled her away from the table. "Beat it," he said, and she walked sullenly around to drape herself over one of the other men there. "You liked er the last time," Amato was saying to Spot. "I asked fer her special fer ya since I knew how much ya liked er."

Spot was keeping his eyes very carefully off of Charlotte now, and though his voice was low, lower than Amato's, she could still make out what he said. "Thas nice, boss, tanks. Real t'oughtful. I jist don wan er tonight."

"Pick another," Amato offered, sweeping an arm across the table to the girls strewn around the room.

"S'alright. Tanks."

Charlotte's view was blocked then as one of the men formerly seated around the table stepped up in front of her.

"You're new," he said.

"I work for the bakery," she answered, gesturing to the cart loaded with desserts.

He grunted a response and took a slice of wuzetka, then thought better of it and took a second slice as well before going back to his place. Amato noticed her then. His eye caught hers and his mouth widened into an easy, charming smile.

"Ms. Charlotte Wright," he said, rising and making his way to her with the smoke of his cigar leaving a trail behind him. "I'm so pleased ya could make it." He took her hand in his free one and kissed it before straightening to survey her. "An ya look lovely. I like da dress."

"Thank you," Charlotte answered as evenly as she could, returning what she hoped was a convincing smile. She kept her eyes on him, avoiding Spot. "Thank you for the dress."

"My pleasure. It suits ya."

"Will you have some wuzetka?" she asked, lifting a square of the chocolate cream pie on a napkin and holding it out to him. His teeth glittered back at her in response.

"T'ank ya, Doll, I will. Why doncha take da cart around da table?" He swept an arm out to indicate the route she ought to take and stepped back so that she could wheel the cart forward with some effort.

"Spot," he called, "come help dis nice goil serve our guests. Da cart's heavy an a girl so pretty shouldn' woik so hard."

Spot, draped like a casual statue, his body tight in a posture of forced calm, dragged his face up to meet them with dread gripping the corners of his eyes.

"That's very kind," Charlotte stammered, "but not necessary. I can manage, thank you."

"Nonsense. I insist."

Spot was at Amato's side, his shoulders stiff. He reached out and took the cart from Charlotte.

"Ms. Wright, this is Mr. Spot Conlon. Maybe you've 'eard of 'im."

She nodded silently, then offered her hand to Spot. "Mr. Conlon," she said.

He took her hand in his—warm, sweaty—and squeezed it lightly. "Nice ta meet ya," he muttered, pulling his hand back as quickly as was polite.

"Spot," Amato continued, "This is Charlotte Wright. I saw 'er glowing in da window of dat Polish Bakery on 7th an' I had ta 'ave 'er."

Charlotte felt his hand on her hip, arm curled around her waist, and resisted the urge to pull away.

"Idn' she lovely?" Amato asked.

"Sure," Spot said. "C'mon, Charlotte, I'll 'elp ya." Not waiting for anything more from his boss, he heaved the cart forward with too much force and the little stacked desserts vibrated on their napkins. Charlotte hurried up next to him. They didn't speak to each other, aware of Amato watching them, but Charlotte could feel his arm close to hers. It brushed her shoulder when she reached across for a plate of gingerbread. She turned back to the table and stretched out to set the gingerbread in the middle.

"Woah," came the voice next to her. "Easy, Doll. Who might you be?"

"Gentlemen," Amato raised his voice over the conversations and as soon as he did the room was quiet. Men with women in their laps or looped around their necks looked up from plates of food and glasses of booze, their faces red with pleasure.

"Dis is Charlotte Wright. She's new ta our little group. Be good ta 'er. We want 'er ta come back." He winked at Charlotte but she got the impression that if he asked for her again, she wouldn't have a choice but to return. She hated that she had come. Anxiety was radiating between her and Spot like an open flame and the glassy eyes of fat men tugged at her new dress and her pink cheeks. As they scanned her, she stepped instinctively closer to Spot. The man nearest her who had asked who she was lumbered to his unsteady feet and planted a wet kiss on her cheek as he served himself from her cart, taking a plate of cheesecake.

"Welcome, Charlotte Wright," he said. "A sweet face ta go wid all dese sweets." He gestured at the cart and then thudded back into his chair and resumed interest in the blonde Spot has discarded earlier. Charlotte served the rest of the table. As she felt the meaty hands on her skirt and the thick eyelids drooping after her, she began to think Alina had been right—she felt like a whore. The women in the room ignored her, focused on their trade and taking their high-paying clients to bed. Before she'd gotten all the way around the room, some of the couples had already peeled off and made for secluded parts of the house in which to be alone. Charlotte watched Spot's blonde eying him resentfully and felt sick. She allowed herself a quick glance at Spot and his eyes were already on hers. They were hard. They betrayed nothing.

"Thank ya, Sweets," Amato said when they rounded the last corner of the table. "Come, sit wid me." He held a hand out to her and, to her relief, patted the empty seat next to him rather than his knee. Spot came around from behind the cart and offered his arm to her and led her dutifully over, pushing the chair in behind her as she sat and then resuming his practiced cool in the chair opposite her on Amato's other side.

"I know dis invitation probably came as a bit of a shock, Love," Amato was saying. He had reached out and fingered the lace that fringed the edge of her sleeve, his finger brushing against the back of her hand. "I didn' mean ta make ya uneasy, askin fer ya widout introducing maself first. It was rude an' I'm sorry." He took a long drag on his dwindling cigar and dropped it onto the plate in front of him which was quickly whisked away by one of the waiters. He took her whole hand in his then. Charlotte swallowed hard and her eyes shot over his shoulder to Spot.

"Do I make ya noivous, Angel?" Amato asked in surprise, pulling back. "Ya fancy Spot 'ere? I don' blame ya." He leaned back and looked over at Spot.

"No," Charlotte stammered, "I'm sorry, I wasn't being—"

"S'alright, don' worry." Amato grinned at her and clapped Spot on the shoulder. ""Ya got good taste. Da ladies always go fer Spot. Ain't dat right, Conlon? Always a ladies man, dis guy 'ere."

Spot shifted uncomfortably and mumbled something but Charlotte didn't catch it.

"I's a'ight, Spot," Amato said, pushing back from the table and getting to his feet. "I know when ta bow out, I ain' mad."

He turned back to Charlotte and bowed low, kissed her hand again.

"T'ank ya fer coming. You'll be 'earing from me again." He smirked at Spot and walked out of the room, leaving them frozen toward each other over the table, silent against the backdrop of simpering women and loud, drunk men and the cracking fire and the clinking of plates and silverware being removed from the table.

Spot's jaw tightened and he stood up suddenly and was at her side, gripping her arm and yanking her up from the table. He pulled her, half running, from the room, down the hall to a flight of stairs which they mounted together. They passed a maid on the way up who, eying Charlotte, let Mr. Conlon know his usual room was ready for him. He brushed her off and walked purposefully down a hall, then led Charlotte through a door, shutting it quickly behind her. He locked the knob and spun to face her.

"What da _hell_ are you doin 'ere?" he hissed.


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: I hope you're enjoying the story so far! I really crave feedback so I'd love to hear from you if there are parts you like or hate or parts you think could use work. Review if you feel so inclined! Thanks for reading!

"What do you mean 'what am I doing here'?" Charlotte demanded, ripping her arm away and taking a step further into the room. "Amato just told you he asked me here. Where have you _been_? I've been looking for you all day!"

They were in a large bedroom, carpeted, with thick curtains pulled closed to the night and a single kerosene lamp glowing on the far bedside table. Everything in the room was thick, dark oak—the matching bedside tables, the large armoire, the grand four-post bed that dominated the space. Over the bed hung an oil painting of the Brooklyn Bridge. The bed was dressed in a dark crimson spread and had pillows stacked three rows deep—red, gold, and purple.

"I was 'ere, obviously." Spot shot back. His shoulders were heaving.

"With the _blonde_?"

Charlotte had backed up until she couldn't move any further and stood with her legs pressed to the bed, watching Spot who was fuming. He had swiped the suspenders from his shoulders and they snapped against his legs. He ran a rough hand through his hair, pushing it up out of his eyes, and glared at her.

"Ya didn' ' _ave_ ta come, are ya crazy? 'Ere I went ta all dis trouble ta sneak around ta keep _you_ safe an' ya waltz up in 'ere like it's not da woist place in da woild fer ya ta be."

"Why am I just realizing that the only reason you've tried to keep me away from Amato is because you don't want me to interfere with your little flings? This has nothing to do with—"

Spot lunged forward suddenly, the force of his body causing her to buckle at the knees, and clamped his hand over her mouth. He crushed her to his chest and they waited there, breathing hard, as someone passed by the door and further down the hallway. When he was sure they were gone, Spot took his hand from her mouth and stepped back. He seemed to be collecting himself in the time it took him to reply.

"I ain't hidin notin from youse. Youse 'as known all 'long what goes on 'ere, wid Amato."

Charlotte turned her face away from him and sunk down onto the bed, scowling. She had always known that she wasn't the only thing Spot had going on. But she didn't like having it thrown in her face.

"What's her name?" she asked finally. Spot hesitated.

"Who?"

"You know who, the girl. Your 'favorite.'" She sneered.

He huffed out a breath and shook his head and went to lean against the armoire. When he realized she was still looking at him, waiting for an answer, he tugged his hand through his hair again and dropped his head down and muttered, "Minnie."

" _Minnie_?" Charlotte asked, incredulous. She couldn't be losing Spot to a _Minnie_.

"Jus' keep yer voice down," Spot demanded, taking two steps back in her direction like he might clap his hand over her mouth again. Charlotte flinched and put her hands up.

"Alright, sorry," she said.

He stood in the middle of the room, halfway between her and the door, and looked at her in silence as she regarded him in the same way.

"Do you think Amato knows?" Charlotte asked finally.

"No," Spot said. "I t'ink it was a freak coincidence." He stabbed a finger at her. "But I _don'_ wancha comin back 'ere, understand? No matta what."

"Spot, I don't think I have a choice. Mr. Symanski wants me to come, and you of all people should know Amato doesn't take 'no' for an answer."

"I dunno . He let it go tanight but…" he rocked uncomfortably on his heels, rubbed his moist palms on his pants. "He likes ya. He wants ya. He'll 'ave ya."

Charlotte shivered and shrunk back further onto the bed. They were quiet for a while. Spot looked away from her but remained where he was in the middle of the room. Charlotte pulled her legs up onto the bed and folded them next to her. They could still hear laughter directly below them and the creak of the stairs.

"Will he be expecting you back downstairs?" Charlotte asked. Spot shook his head.

"Not fer anudder hour 'er so."

Charlotte raised an eyebrow but didn't say anything.

Spot walked over to her and sat next to her on the bed.

"Listen, Doll, I know dis ain't 'ow ya wanted ta see me. Dat goil, Minnie, she don' mean nuttin ta me. She's easy ta ferget. Dat's why she's my favorite. 'Cause I gotta keep up appearances but I don' wan't no one but you. An' she don't mean nuttin, she don't complicate dat, so I see 'er sometimes. It idn't nuttin like you."

Charlotte didn't answer and she didn't move. Spot sat looking at her another minute, then he leaned back and stretched out across the bed. He reached a hand up to her shoulder and she let him pull her back next to him. She rolled to face him, their faces close, and he put an arm over her waist.

"I gotta plan. A way ta getcha outta all dis. I ain't quite woiked it all out yet but I jis wantcha ta know dat I am lookin out fer ya. I ain't gonna let dis t'ing hoit you."

"I know."

Spot closed his eyes and pressed his forehead to hers. "Ya look beautiful," he said.

"Thank you."

"I love ya."

"I know."

"I never been so scared in all me life as when I looked up 'an saw youse standin dere in Amato's dinin' room."

Charlotte nodded and closed her eyes too. "I know."


	6. Chapter 6

Spot walked Charlotte home later that night. Part of him thought it would be better if they weren't seen together, but the other part needed to know she was safe. They didn't speak to each other. Charlotte felt sick and leaned on his arm out of necessity rather than affection. She tugged at the stiff collar of her dress which felt uncomfortable against her throat. When they got to her building, Spot guided her up the steps by the hand but didn't go in after her. She could see in his face that his mind was already shifting gears, onto the next thing. Whether or not that thing had to do with her she didn't know. She climbed the stairs to her room and locked the door behind her.

Spot turned back the way he'd come and strolled up to Jinks who was waiting a few yards back in the open light of the bar. He stood with his hands in his pockets, all his weight shifted to one side. His dark hat was pulled low to hide sandy hair and hazel eyes. His pale plaid shirt hung loosely on one side where it had come untucked. Spot reached him and brushed past, knowing he would fall in step.

"How da hell did dis 'appen?" Spot's voice was even but Jinks knew better.

"I t'ink Amato's on to us," Jinks answered.

"Ya t'ink?" Spot spit back.

"He's bein real careful wid information. I didn' know he was gonna bring 'er in tanight. I followed 'er to a dress shop afta she left da bakery but I didn' know what she was doin dere. I 'ad no way uh knowin dat's what it was for."

"How'd he find out about 'er?"

"I dunno, Spot. Sure wudn't from me. I ain't noticed nobody around 'er, I swear."

Jinks struggled to keep up with Spot's pace, past stoops and building corners. When they didn't take the turn toward their apartment or Amato's place, Jinks stopped and called after him.

"Where ya goin?"

"Manhattan." Spot continued walking without turning.

"Want me ta come wid ya?"

"Naw. See what ya kin find out about Amato. I'll be back tomorrow."

It was late—or early, rather—the part of the night when the dark had a kind of sheen to it but the sun hadn't shown yet. The moon had set but the streetlights still glowed so Spot could see well enough. This was his favorite time to be out. He felt untouchable, like the city truly belonged to him and there was no one alive to stop him from taking it. He could forget that it was really Amato who owned the city and Spot who worked for him, and he could forget about the mess with Charlotte. Instead, he plunged his hands deep in his pockets and fingered the few smooth marbles that rolled there as he walked as quickly as he could. It felt unnatural not to have his cane with him, but there wasn't time to go back for it.

The sky was warming when Spot crossed over into Manhattan. He passed the Newsboys Lodging House and continued on a few blocks, then came to stop in front of a dingy white building. Once it had been a house, but now the various rooms were rented out as offices. Up three flights of stairs—stop just before the exit to the roof, turn left—was a quiet hallway. On the third door down, on the left side, was a green door with a plaque that read: David Jacobs, Attorney at Law.

David had only recently graduated with his law degree but already he was doing exceptionally well. So well, in fact, that he'd been able to hire Jack on as his assistant. Jack didn't have the discipline to make it through law school, but he had a charisma and gusto that complimented David's undeniably logical approach. Their work on the Newsies Strike had proven to them how successful they were as a team. Only now were they partners in an official capacity.

There were times that Spot envied their clean, comfortable existence. He never would have guessed that Jack could end up doing something so legitimate, and he couldn't help but compare their two situations. Jack got a cushy paycheck and the knowledge that he was helping people. He got to go home every day to the same place and sleep in the same bed. In a lot of ways, Spot felt that he himself had graduated from newsie life to something just as disheartening and convoluted. He was also aware that he had downgraded—he tried to tell himself that working for Amato had opened doors for him and expanded his resources, but in reality he had reverted to taking someone else's orders after having grown accustomed to being the one dispatching them for so long.

Still, Spot wasn't operating under the illusion that he could be any good at anything else. He'd spent his entire life cultivating a certain persona, and he knew there was no way out of the identity he'd adopted. Threatening, bullying, enforcing, knowing all—these were his gifts. There was nothing else for him.

The doors to David's building were locked when he finally arrived at the stoop around four in the morning. He'd tugged on each a few times before giving up and settling down on the top step, his back to the wall, letting his hat slope forward over his eyes. Hours later, it was the familiar call of the local newsies that roused him. Or maybe it was Jack kicking the toe of his boot with his own.

"Ey, Spot. Dat youse? Whaddaya say?"

Spot started from sleep and his hat fell down onto the step next to him. He squinted up into the sun, which was being partially obstructed by Jack—tall and thin and dressed in slacks and vest with a clean white shirt—and David, closer to Spot's height, his curly hair spilling out over his forehead and blowing in the wind, wearing a dark suit and tie and shiny shoes.

"Morning, Gents," Spot said, climbing stiffly to his feet, sore from sitting so long on the stony steps. He stretched and cracked his neck and put his hat back on.

"Was we expectin youse?" Jack asked.

"Nah. Dis an impromptu visit."

"Well you're always welcome," David said, turning his key in the front door and leading the way up the first set of stairs. "Come on up. We're not expecting any clients until this afternoon."

Spot couldn't keep from scoffing aloud. "Youse a real office monkey now, Kelly," he said.

"Yeah," Jack answered, "but at least I get ta get out ta da roof whenever I want. An da guys come by plenty. Lotsa times deys got demselves in a bind and needs me ta bail em out."

"Some tings never change," Spot agreed. "Ya never really get to hang up ya hat."

"Chance—he's da knew leadah over at da Lodgin 'Ouse—he does a good job but he's green. An a lotta da guys still come ta me jist cause we got 'istory, ya know?"

Spot nodded. They mounted the third flight of stairs.

"You pantin, Jacky-boy? Youse outta shape."

"Yeah," he answered sheepishly. He was facing away from Spot but a redness spread under his hairline and over his ears. "I ain't been runnin fer my life much dese days. Sittin at a desk all day, ya lose whatcha had walkin da streets all da time as a newsie."

The reached David's door and waited for him to unlock it and went inside.

"What about you, Spot?" David asked. "What kind of boss in Louis Amato? Does he have you out in the streets a lot?"

"Wouldn' 'ave it any udder way," Spot lied.

It was just one large, open room with three windows set in the far wall that let the sun spill in across the floor and the two desks there. David's was backed against the left wall and Jack's against the right. It was clear whose was whose by the level of tidiness of each and the fact that there were two plush chairs across from David's desk for clients. There was a large woven rug in the center of the floor and a cart with coffee under the windows and a loveseat to the immediate right of the door. The only adornment on the walls was a framed copy of their self-produced _Newsie Banner_ and, beside it, a framed copy of their picture in the New York Sun.

"Nice," Spot said, nodding to them as Jack and David went to their respective desks, leaving him to stand uncomfortably in the doorway. He didn't know why, but he resisted the urge to take his hat off. David set a brown leather briefcase on his chair and removed his suit jacket, hanging it on a coat rack behind his desk. Jack unslung a messenger bag from over his shoulder and sat down in his chair, swinging his feet up onto the top of it with a thud that made David jump. He shot him a look.

"So what can we do for you, Spot?" David asked, turning back to him. He must've noticed Spot looked uncomfortable because he sat against his desk and pushed one of the plush chairs out to him.

"Naw, t'anks. I'll stand." Spot removed his hat and pushed his fingers through his hair. "Listen, Jack," he turned to his friend before thinking better of it and recentering himself to address them both. "Dave," he added.

"Geeze, Spot, ya look a little jumpy," Jack piped up. "Jis get it out. Wassa mattah? Sometin' appen ta Jinks?"

"Naw, he's fine. I've just got meself inta little bit of a bind…It's bout a goil."

Jack grinned and said, "when isn't it bout a goil wid you, Conlon?" but David's look of intent concern didn't waiver.

"What girl?" David asked. Spot sighed and spun his hat in his hands, feeling around and around its worn edge.

"What goil?" Jack echoed, letting his feet fall from his desk and leaning forward to rest his elbows on it. "I nevah seen ya like dis, Spot," he said.

"It's no big deal, Jacky-boy, jist some broad I been knockin boots wid. Only I been keepin 'er secret, see. An I t'ink cat's outta da bag wid Amato."

Jack raised his eyebrows. "A goil Amato can't know bout? Why not?"

"I never wanted ta get 'er involved wid him and what we do, ya know?" He looked over at David as if the thought had suddenly occurred to him. "Yer not gonna arrest me er nothing, right?"

"I'm a lawyer, not a constable." He answered, and when Spot's gaze didn't let up, David said, "No, Spot, we're not going to arrest you. We're your friends. We'll help you if we can."

"Ya like 'er," Jack said. "Dis one's different or ya wouldn't care about it like dis." He was studying Spot's face and smirking a little, which annoyed Spot. But he wouldn't be asking for their help unless he really needed it, and he did.

"I like 'er," he confirmed. The three of them sat in silence.

"Who is she?" David asked.

"'Er name's Charlotte," Spot answered. "She woiks in a Polish bakery in Brooklyn."

Jack and David exchanged surprised glances. "Always tought you'd end up wid a painted lady, Spot, das all," Jack explained when Spot looked at him pointedly. Spot scoffed and dropped his hands to his side.

"I been wid plenty a dem," he confirmed. "I been wid plenty a women a all kinds. Dis one's different."

"Charlotte," David clarified. He lifted one leg onto the surface of his desk and settled onto it. "Tell us about her."

"Why you gotta know bout 'er?" Spot demanded. "I jist tol' ya all ya need ta know."

"Easy, Spot," Jack said, putting a hand up. "We'se jist tryin ta help. Isn' dat what ya want?"

Spot nodded. He took two steps to his right and felt the loveseat behind his legs and lowered himself onto it.

"I met 'er years ago. We been tagether a long time now. Since before da strike. I never told none a my boys bout 'er. I dunno why. I jist liked ta keep 'er ta myself, ya know? I didn' want anyone ta use her 'gainst me."

"You wanted to protect her," David said.

"Yeah, dat an' I got my reputation, ya know?" he patted his chest. "I didn' want nobody t'inkin I'd gone soft. Brooklyn ain't like Man'attan—ain't all jist friendship an' loyalty. Some a dat, but mostly dey jist follow whoever can keep control. Dat needed to be me."

Jack nodded his understanding. David didn't move.

"Anyway, I sold 'er a paper one day. She was pretty but I didn' t'ink much of it. Den she was walkin away an dere was dis crowd a woikers strikin' at da bank er somethin'. I don' member what about now. But I saw 'er walkin inta dis crowd an I jist followed 'er cause I didn' want 'er ta get hoit. An den I followed 'er all day way ta her woik. I jist stood outside fer awhile. Felt like I was dere fer a reason but I didn' know why. Jinks caught up ta me and I gave 'im me papes ta sell an I went in da bakery. I dunno what I was t'inkin. I didn' ave a nickel ta my name at da time. But I asked 'er fer watah an she hand it ta me in dis little glass so's I gotta keep askin fer more. An finally, she goes ta da back to refill da glass an brings me back dis pastry, sometin dat got a little boined an dey couldn' sell it, an she gives it ta me."

Spot could see her leaning over the counter to him, her dark hair tumbling forward like a thick, velvet curtain at a vaudeville show, and her dress buttoned up to the neck so he couldn't see anything, though he'd tried, and her eyes had been heavy on his, knowing exactly why he was there. He remembered leaving after a couple of hours when the shopkeeper's wife seemed suspicious and he'd walked across the street to the deli and sat on the curb smoking until Charlotte came out after dark. His stomach had rumbled but he'd ignored it. Some of his boys had wandered by but he'd brushed them off. And then she'd left work without looking at him and walked off down the street and he'd slipped off behind her and caught up to her and stepped on the back of her skirt, pinning her to the street, so she'd turn around and see him and smile in recognition.

"Spot Conlon," she'd said. "I never thought I'd see the likes of you perched in a clean Polish bakery. But there you were all morning."

And Spot had smirked and taken his hat off and asked for her name, which she had leaned forward to whisper in his ear, warm against him, and he remembered being surprised that she was so forward and that she seemed to clearly know what he wanted from her and that it hadn't seemed to bother her. He'd felt his hands lace around her waist but she'd pulled away with another smile and walked on with one hand outstretched behind her to keep him back.

He'd spent the rest of the week selling papers like usual in front of the deli where he could see her. He'd watched her beam brightly at customer after customer and he'd burned that she'd look at anyone else that way. But every night, though he knew she saw him outside during the day, he'd leave his spot on the sidewalk and return to the lodging house. And every night he'd lie awake in his bunk, sometimes with another woman asleep next to him or heavy on his chest, and he'd think about her hair spilled out over him and her lips on his neck.


	7. Chapter 7

Spot was surprised to see Charlotte standing before him on the docks in the hot sun late on an August afternoon. She'd approached a newsie on the street and asked to be taken to him. Her limp white blouse clung to her skin and drooped open at the neck where she'd unbuttoned the top few buttons. There was an obvious shadow of sweat around her waist where the band of her skirt collected the shirt against her. Her hair was pulled up off her neck and wrapped in a bun that hung tiredly to one side. Tendrils of it stuck to her neck and forehead. She stopped before him, where he lounged on some shipping crates, causing him to start at the sight of her and scramble into a sitting position, aware that his shirt was unbuttoned to the waistband of his trousers. For the first time since he'd seen her, Charlotte looked uncomfortable and out of place. Her smile seemed apologetic and she shrunk away from the whoops and hollers of his newsies—some swimming, others littered along the docks. Spot jumped down from his perch, his shirt pulling free and billowing out behind him briefly, and he offered his arm to her and led her away, into the lodging house and up the creaky wooden steps to his room.

Spot was the only newsie with his own room. One of the bunks had been dragged in and pushed against the far wall and he had a dingy mirror and wash bin with a stool in front of it and his own towel. There was a captain's chest pushed against the wall opposite the bed, and the door in that wall led to the shared bathroom. The room was small but it afforded him some privacy, which none of the others could boast.

"Sit down," he offered, or maybe ordered, indicating the low stool in the room. She shook her head politely but stepped deeper into the room, glancing around at his meager belongings. He closed the door behind them and leaned against it nonchalantly.

"I didn' spect dis," he said.

She turned to face him anxiously.

"You don't know me," she started. "I see you around outside the shop but I know you don't really know anything about me—"

"I'd like ta know ya," he interrupted, pushing off from the door and striding up to her, looking knowingly down into her eyes and reaching for her hand. She didn't pull away but also wasn't able to meet his gaze.

"Look, I'm sorry, I know how this must look," she stammered.

"I like how it looks," he assured her.

"Mr. Conlon," she begged.

"Jesus," he laughed, "Don' call me dat." He had both of her hands in his and brushed the back of one with his thumb, smudging ink across it.

"Spot, then," she corrected, "sorry. I'm here because I've heard things about you. About the things you can do."

He raised an eyebrow. "'Ave ya, Doll? Dere all true. I kin do all kinds a t'ings."

Charlotte pulled her hands back and stepped away from him and looked at his desperately and he understood and let his face go hard and stepped back against the door.

"Whaddaya need?" he asked.

"I need information. About a couple. I think they came through Ellis Island but I'm not sure."

"Dere names?"

"Symanski. Eryk and Alina Symanski. They're Polish."

Spot looked at her skeptically. "Ain't dat who owns da bakery ya woik at?"

"Yes."

"Wassa mattah wid em? Ya don't trust em?"

"I just like to know who I'm working for."

"Interestin. Any idea when det mighta come through?"

"I'm not sure," Charlotte hesitated.

"S'alright. We'll find 'em."

Spot assigned one of the younger newsies—Gage—to the project. He asked after the Symanskis for months, but nothing much came of it. They couldn't find any record of them and none of the usual smugglers seemed to know them. Once Spot thought they were close, but it turned out to be another couple with the same last name. Over this time, he saw Charlotte now and then to update her. She came by the lodging house at first, but after a while Spot asked her to stop. He didn't want the boys getting used to her. Truthfully, he didn't want the competition. Instead, he met her at a park near the bakery. Sometimes she brought stale pastries from the day before or fresh loaves pilfered from the oven on her way out. She handed it to Spot and he tore it in part and handed half back.

Sometimes, Spot would walk Charlotte back to the bakery afterwards, or the group home she lived in if she had an afternoon off. On these walks, he studied her out of the corner of his eye. He learned the whiteness of her hands, the slope of her shoulders under her blouse, the way her neck stretched on for an eternity when she tipped her head to one side.

One day, after they met at dusk, Spot walked her back to the group home, where the girls slept two to a bed and Charlotte had to help wash the bathroom and kitchen floors once a month with lye that burned the skin off her hands. They stopped at the front steps and Spot could see she didn't want to go in. They had not mentioned the Symanskis during their meetings in some time.

"Have you found anything?" Charlotte asked him.

"I stopped looking," he answered. She laughed a little and dipped her head.

"Dey seem okay. Safe 'nough. I t'ink yer in good hands."

Charlotte nodded, looking down at her boots. "I think so."

They stood in silence for a moment. Charlotte looked back up at Spot.

"I don't want to go in."

"Den don't."

She tilted her head and lifted her face up to his and he kissed her.

"I shouldn't been seen with you," she said, pulling back, "not like this. I could lose my job. And they won't let me stay here anymore," she'd added, indicating the group home.

"Would dat be so bad?" he smirked then and pulled her into his side and began to lead her away. "Stay wid me tonight," he offered, or maybe ordered, and she agreed.


	8. Chapter 8

David perched on the edge of his desk, one leg up while the other pressed into the floor to keep him in place. His brow was furrowed and he looked at Spot seriously. Jack was seated behind his desk, leaning back in the chair with his hands laced behind his head. Spot stood somewhere between them, hat twisting in his hands, feet planted heavily, channeling every ounce of brazen leadership he'd ever developed. It didn't seem to be helping him.

"What is it you're wanting from us?" David asked finally.

"I wanna help ya move yer business outta da state," Spot answered flatly.

David scoffed. "What? My law practice? We have a niche clientele here; we're able to help underrepresented people, help our friends."

"Dey got underrepresented 'peoples' all over," Spot shot back. "An I need someone ta take Charlotte. I wanna pay fer ya ta move yer business outta New York and take Charlotte with you. Ya don even afta give 'er a job er nothin, just take 'er with ya."

Jack and David exchanged a glance.

"Spot," David began, "you know we want to help you, but you're asking us to completely uproot the life we've built for ourselves here for a girl we've never even met. My family's here—"

"Ain't I yer family?" Spot demanded. "Ain't you got no loyalty ta me?"

"Sure we do, Spot, you know we do," David continued, putting a hand up to calm him. "Look, maybe we can look into this Amato guy and see—"

"Don't you see dat don't do me no good? Amato's untouchable."

"'Sides," Jack spoke up finally, thoughtfully, "anyt'ing we implicate Amato in, Spot's implicated, too. More den likely Spot'd be da one ta take da fall."

"Well why doesn't he take this girl himself?" David asked, turning to Jack, the vein in his forehead pressing against the skin, his face reddening.

"I got contacts 'ere," Spot interjected, "I woiked hard ta get in wid Amato. I've known him since my newsie days. Ya can't just waltz inta some new city's underground like dat."

"Can't you get a reference or something from Amato?" David persisted.

Spot look at him incredulously and took a step toward him. Jack stood suddenly and put a hand on Spot's shoulder.

"It don' woik like dat, Davey," he said to his partner.

They were all quiet for a while, breathing heavily and glaring at each other.

"Why can't we move Charlotte out of state on her own?" David suggested. "We can get her a place, find her a job.

"Dere's no way dat's happening," Spot glowered. Jack could see that he was closing himself off from them, hardening in frustration at the rejection. He walked around the front of his desk and stopped before his friend.

"If ya could take 'er yerself, would ya? Ya sure dis ain't just some way a you tryin ta get outta da commitment?"

Spot seemed to actually think it over before replying, "I'd take 'er if I could."

"Maybe we can help you find a new job," David offered, but Spot was already shaking his head.

"I ain't good at nothing but this."

Spot looked up at Jack with a new determination in his eyes. "What about you, Kelly?" he asked. "Ya still wanna see Santa Fe?"

"Dat's an old dream, Spot. I gotta life here now," Jack answered firmly, spreading his arms to indicate the room. Spot's face slipped into anger again and he kicked the leg of Jack's desk.

"Dis how ya treat yer friends?" he demanded. "After all we been through ya won't even try ta help me? You still owe me for the strike, Kelly. I never cashed in on that favor."

"I know, Spot, I know. Look, we'll do whatever else we can ta help, but we ain't movin."

David started to say something but Spot ducked under Jack's arm and threw the door open, storming down the stairs. He could hear them calling out and feel the wooden stairs shifting under him as someone else started down, but he went out into the street and melted into the morning crowd before they could catch up to him.


	9. Chapter 9

A/N: Thank you to everyone who has given me feedback so far! I enjoy hearing from you and try to keep your suggestions in mind. Please continue making me laugh and helping me to improve my story! Hope you're all still enjoying! XXX

Charlotte had been distracted all day. She worried that Amato was going to show up and drag her away, or she worried that something would happen to Spot, or she worried that Spot wouldn't come to see her that night, or she worried that he would. She burned a whole oven full of pastries and had to stay late to make another batch, so she was late getting home that night, climbing the stairs in the dark, unlocking the door, crossing the room to light the lamp on the table. She sat down in one of the chairs and bent to unbutton her boots, then stopped when she heard the faintest of footsteps on the landing outside her door. Someone knocked lightly—not Spot. She rose slowly and crept to the door, turning the knob so that it made no sound and pulling it back the few centimeters necessary to see who was in the hallway. As soon as she did, she attempted to slam it shut again, but he caught it on his arm and forced his way in. She recognized him as the person who'd been following her—the same one she'd lost on her way to the dress shop and the same one Spot had insisted didn't exist. There he was, hunched in her doorway. He took one step in and closed the door behind him, and Charlotte backed away to the other side of the table, putting it between them. He raised his hands to show that he meant her no harm, but there was a strange intensity in his eyes and his head was tipped curiously to one side. He was studying her.

"Spot sent me," he said.

"Sure he did," Charlotte bit back, "you're one of Amato's spies. You've been following me."

"No," he insisted, then continued, "well, yes. I 'ave been followin ya. But on Spot's orders, not Amato's."

"Orders?"

"Yeah. He's ma boss." He dropped his hands and inched closer. "I'm Jinks," he said. He brushed his hand on the leg of his pants and held it out to her, his hat already clutched in the other hand. Charlotte didn't take it.

"Look," he said, remembering, "I got proof." He reached into his pocket for something; Charlotte tightened her hands over the back of the chair in front of her, ready to hurl it at him if necessary. What he pulled out was a golden bit key on a long strip of leather. Charlotte recognized it immediately as Spot's. It was a copy of the key to her apartment, the one they were standing in, which he'd had made shortly after moving her in years prior. He always wore it around his neck.

"Dis da key ta yer place?" Jinks asked.

Charlotte nodded.

"We always wondered what it unlocked," he went on. He grinned a little.

"How do I know," Charlotte said shakily, "that you didn't take it from him? You could still be working for Amato."

"Yer just gonna have ta decide ta trust me," he said apologetically, "that's all I got."

"Where's Spot? Why didn't he come himself? Is he okay?"

Jinks hesitated and looked down at the table top.

"Amat's got him," he answered finally. "Right afta he told me da plan fer you. I'm 'sposed ta get ya outta here."

"And go where?"

"Philadelphia."

Charlotte's head shot up in surprise. She'd never really thought about what would happen when it finally came down to this. She had suspected he'd hide her in a neighboring borough, or even just somewhere safer in Brooklyn. But silly her—nowhere in Brooklyn was safe.

She was reeling. Spot had had her followed. She had been someone's orders. He had lied to her all those times he promised no one was following her. He was sending her away.

"What's in Philadelphia?" she asked.

"No Amato," Jinks replied.

"Is he coming, too?"

Again, Jinks hesitated. "Not right away. I'm supposed ta wait fer word of what ta do once we get dere."

"He's not planning to meet us there? He's just shipping me out?"

Jinks walked straight up to her, his eyes anxious, and put his hands over the tops of her arms to pull her to her feet, and she was afraid of the strangeness in his eyes, the tightness of them.

"Spot loves ya," he said lowly. "Dis is ta keep ya safe. Dat's all we ever wanted."

"We?" she asked softly.

Jinks let his hands fall and shook his head.

"Das all Spot cares about. He doesn' t'ink it'll do much good fer him ta be dere."

"But we'd be together," Charlotte persisted, her voice still quiet.

Jinks started to say something before thinking better of it and replying, "He loves ya. I'm sure he'll come."

He reached out and pressed a hand to her arm again, then replaced his hat on his head.

"We gotta be goin'. Get yer stuff together an we can leave."

Charlotte didn't move. "He's in trouble, isn't he? They're hurting him."

"Probably."

"And you really think they'll come for me?"

"I dunno. But best not ta take chances. Spot wants ya clear of all dis. An I agree wid 'im."

"Do you agree with everything Spot says?"

"No." Jinks continued looking at her steadily. "I t'ink he shoulda married ya years ago, reputation be damned."

He seemed so sincere Charlotte wasn't sure whether to be comforted or put off by the intensity. Instead, she made her way over to the bed and pulled the pillow case off her pillow.

"Don't you think we should stay to make sure he's okay?"

"No. We're s'pposed ta go ta Philadelphia. We gotta place lined up. I got money." He reached into his shirt and pulled out a thick envelope. Charlotte's eyes widened.

"Where'd you get all that?"

"Spot's been savin fer dis."

Charlotte took her coat and scarf from the peg on the wall and folded them into the pillow case. She reached under the bed for the old pair of boots and put them on, packing the newer ones that had been on her feet. She added the hairbrush from the chair at the foot of the bed and a handful of loose hair pins. She pulled the nightgown and robe from under the sheets and stuffed them in, too. She tied the end of the pillowcase shut and turned to Jinks.

"Dat all?" he asked. "What about dat?" He nodded to the frilly lavender dress that hung on a hook on the wall.

"Leave it," Charlotte answered. She lifted the keys from around her own neck and removed her copy of the apartment key and laid it on the table.

"What about the Symanskis?" she asked, holding up the key to the bakery.

"Bring it," Jinks said, "we'll mail it back."

Charlotte replaced the key around her neck and turned down the kerosene lamp. She followed Jinks to the door where she stopped to look around the room. She thought of Spot in the bed with the sheets twisted around his legs and of him sitting at the table waiting for her to dress. She remembered him at the small fridge with the glass bottle of milk frosty in his hands and him peering out the window between the curtain flaps.

"Charlotte," Jinks urged, and she went out and waited as he crossed back to the bed and wrapped the blanket and top sheet around his arm before returning to her side wordlessly and locking the door behind them He led her down the stairs to a waiting horse and cart, the sight of which surprised Charlotte.

"Is that ours?"

"I bought 'em this evenin," Jinks explained upon noticing. "It's a long way. I didn' want ya ta have ta' walk."

She looked over at him and smiled appreciatively. He took her things and heaved them up into the back where a small carpet bag was tucked up under the wooden seat. Then he put his hand out for her and hoisted her up onto the bench before climbing up beside her and taking the reins.

"You know how to do this?" Charlotte asked apprehensively.

"Don' worry," Jinks assured her. "I'm gonna get us dere safe and sound."

He cracked the reins over the horse's muscled back and they clattered off over the dirt and cobblestone, out of Brooklyn, in the direction of Philadelphia.


	10. Chapter 10

Charlotte tried to stay up with Jinks as they rode through the night, but she'd been up early and worked late and her body ached so that it was hard to hold herself up on the bench. She felt nervous and suspicious and didn't quite trust the situation enough to sleep, but sometime in the early morning hours Jinks pulled the cart over and helped her over the seat into the back where she was glad he'd taken the blankets from her bed. She pulled the pillow case of her things up under her cheek and wrapped herself in the blankets and fell quickly to sleep.

She dreamed of a rocking ship on a rough sea, sometimes jolted awake when they ran over a rock or rough ground. Spot was there in her dreams, his gray eyes like the color of the water, his face hard, his mouth set into a scowl. She reached for him as the ship tripped over the waves, but his arms remained at his sides, his mean eyes never straying from her. She slept restlessly for a few hours and then she remained in the cart with her eyes open to the blushing sky and the blankets pulled tightly around her rather than returning to her place next to Jinks.

With the sun rising on the horizon, Jinks drove them off the road into the trees where he parked the cart and unhooked the horse, leaving it tied loosely to a tree where it could graze and rest. It must have been around seven o'clock in the morning. Charlotte sat up and watched him lift a canvas bag she hadn't noticed before from under the wooden seat, taking it to the horse who dunked his nose in and drained the water stored there.

"How far is it?" Charlotte asked. "How long will it take us to get there?"

"It's about 90 miles," Jinks answered, "start ta finish. We'll be a good three days on the road in all." He turned the canvas bag inside-out and draped it over the bench seat to dry out in the sun.

"I'll go lookin fer more watah in a few hours," he said. "I'm gonna get some sleep. D'ya mind?" He gestured up into the cart beside her and she scooted as far over to one side as possible and felt the cart heave and shift as he pulled himself up. He settled down on his back with his arms behind his head and dropped his cap over his face.

"Are you cold?" Charlotte asked.

"Nah, I'm used to it."

Charlotte lowered herself back down next to him and lay stiffly on her back, arms tight to her sides over the blankets.

"You worried bout me?" Jinks asked, seeming to sense her discomfort.

"I don't know you," she answered.

"Dis gotta be weird fer ya, an I get dat. But I ain't gonna let nothin happen ta ya an I'm sure not gonna be da one ta cause anything. Youse can rest easy."

Charlotte didn't answer and she didn't move, but she did let her eyes close a few minutes later and she slept a few more hours until the sun between the tree branches above them got too hot on her body and shone too much in her face. She got up and stripped the sheet from herself and lowered herself over the side of cart to look around.

She was hungry and her mouth was dry. She wanted to look in the cart for food or more water but she didn't want to wake Jinks by going through his belongings. Instead, she wandered over to the grazing horse, patting its side as she passed, and moved deeper through the glade and into the trees. Behind her, past Jinks and the cart and on the other side of the road, train tracks ran parallel to their path. Ahead of her, the trees stretched out, scattered loosely in the grass so that the light filtered in. She hiked her skirt up and tucked one side into the waist of her skirt, parting the weeds with her boots and stockings and stepping over felled tree branches. She planned to walk in a straight line for half a mile or so and turn back if she didn't find any water. It felt good to stretch her legs and to breathe clean air and listen to the birds and the breeze. She tucked her hair up to feel the warm light on her neck, scanning back and forth for water in all directions.

She didn't find any water but she did have time to think. She hoped Spot was alright. She could picture him staring her down in her dreams and she didn't like what it might mean. She was hurt by him and angry but she was worried, too. She didn't guess that Amato would be very gentle or forgiving of people he felt wronged by, especially someone as high up in the ranks as Spot. She stopped under one of the taller trees and leaned against it and closed her eyes. Even with the birds pittering and the wind in the leaves, she felt very far away from Brooklyn.

When she got back to the clearing, Jinks was standing next to the car without his hat, tucking a piece of paper back into his pocket.

"Dere ya are. Glad ya didn't get lost."

"Me too. I was careful."

"Das good. Ya find anyt'ing interestin?"

"No water."

He nodded off to the right and deeper into the woods. "Dere's some dat way."

"How do you know that?"

"I gotta map."

He looped his arms under the suspenders that hung at his sides and pulled them up over broad shoulders. "You comin' or stayin'?"

"I'll come," Charlotte answered, and she fell into step beside him. They walked in silence and she snuck glances sideways to study him.

The night before it had been too dark to really see him, but now that she could he felt familiar. Probably she had met him at the lodging house before she and Spot had gotten together. He had dirty blonde hair that was trimmed at his ears and neck and flipped forward over his forehead. There were sun spots on his face and ears and neck, disappearing under the collar of his shirt. He was at least a foot taller than she was, and broad.

"So you're the muscle," she said.

"What's dat?" He looked over and down at her and his eyes were light brown, almost the same color as his hair.

"Well Spot's strong but he's not a big guy. That must be why he keeps you around."

She could see him puff up a little, his shoulders rolling back, and he grinned.

"Guess so," he said. "I been his enforcer long as I can remember."

"You're a newsie?"

"I was. Aged out wid Spot an followed him ta work fer Amato."

"You're a loyal friend."

"So's Spot," he said seriously. "We take care of each odder."

"That's nice."

They fell into silence again and walked on. Charlotte noticed the canvas water bag folded up in his back pocket. Before long they reached a thin brook, the clear water blinding in the high sun. Charlotte realized that she'd been holding her breath and released it in relief when she saw the stream. The two of them crouched down beside each other and cupped handfuls of it to their mouths, too greedy to keep it from running down their chins and into the collars. Charlotte unbuttoned her blouse and rubbed a damp hand across the back of her neck. Jinks unfolded the water bag and sunk it under the surface of the water to fill while she took off her boots and stockings and waded downstream from him, the hem of her skirt floating around her.

"The water's so warm," she said, and she wasn't sure why but it pleased her.

"Yeah," Jinks answered, straightening and watching her. "You ever been out in a place like dis?"

Charlotte shook her head. "Not really. Not like this. I've lived in New York my whole life. What about you?"

"I like ta get outta da city when I can. Sometimes I'd walk all night just ta get to a place like dis."

"Spot loves the city," Charlotte said. "He always talks about it like it's a lover."

Jinks laughed. "He does at dat, yeah. But you gotta t'ink a what Brooklyn means ta him. He woiked hard ta make it his."

"I know."

Jinks set the water down on the bank and pushed his suspenders off his shoulders and pulled his shirt off from behind him without unbuttoning it. Charlotte looked away from him. He waded in behind her and splashed water up over his shoulders and chest, rubbing away soot and dirt. With her head down to watch her footing, Charlotte walked carefully back up to where he was. He ducked his head to catch her eyes and smiled at her, his large, square face widening, and offered his hand to her to help her the rest of the way. His hand gripped hers tightly.

"You hungry?" he asked on the way back to the horse and cart.

"Yes," she answered. He'd stuffed his shirt into the waist of his pants to hang down behind him, leaving his bare chest to dry in the sun. The water swung in his left hand, his free hand brushing along between them as they picked their way back through the trees.

"I didn't think to bring food or anything useful," she said, and laughed a little.

"Das okay, Doll," Jinks said. He glanced over at her and she at him but she didn't say anything about the pet name. "I brought supplies," he went on.

"In the carpet bag?" she asked. "I assumed that was your things."

"I'm wearin my t'ings, mostly," he said. "I left almost everything."

They made it back to the cart and he leaned over the side to the carpet bag while Charlotte spread the topmost blanket from her bed on the grass nearby. Jinks carried over the water bag and two wooden cups and a loaf of bread and three red apples. He handed her a cup and an apple and ripped the bread in half to split with her. She ripped a chunk off with her teeth while he poured some of the water into the cup she held steady for him. Then he got up and watered the horse again and held an apple out for him. When he returned to sit cross-legged next to her, the tight muscles in his bare stomach rolling up, Charlotte swallowed the bite in her mouth and said, "What's your name?"

"Jinks," he reminded her, starting in on his own meal.

"Your real name."

He looked up at her slyly, working a piece of bread into his cheek.

"You should know better den ta ask a newsie his real name."

"Maybe," she answered with a smile. Then, after a moment, "what's Spot's real name?"

"Oh no," he shook his head. "Yer tryin ta get me in trouble, goil. Dat ain't nice."

"Come on, he's never told me. Do you know it?"

"No," he said.

"Please. Really?"

He looked up at her earnestly. "I really dunno. Honest. Don't 'member mine neither. I been goin by Jinks fer so long."

"How'd you get the name?"

"Das a long story."

"So you're not going to tell me?"

"Maybe some udder time."

Charlotte stretched out on her side, propped up on one elbow, and rolled the unmarked apple idly under her palm. She could feel Jinks' eyes on her, but when she looked up he was looking into the bread in his hands, tearing off another piece to pop into his mouth.

"How long did you say you've been following me?" Charlotte asked.

Jinks swallowed hard. "Dunno. Years."

She chewed the inside of her cheek.

"You don' like dat," he said.

"No."

"I'm sorry. I was just lookin out fer ya."

"Yeah," she replied. "I think that's true. I believe that."

"You gonna bother me dis whole meal?" he asked, grinning at her.

She smiled back. "I thought I might."

"Well why don'chu let me ask you some t'ings. Make it even."

"Why do I care if it's even?"

Jinks' bread was gone and he bit into his apple and held it out to her.

"No," she shook her head, "thank you. I've got mine." She tossed her apple up into the air once and caught it.

"You gonna eat it?"

"Later."

"So," he said, taking another bite of apple. "Yer name's Charlotte." He looked up at her intensely. "Dat your _real_ name?"

Charlotte laughed and nodded. "Yes. Promise."

"You work in a bakery."

"That's right."

"Yer in love wid Spot Conlon."

"I am."

Jinks swallowed and chomped another bite and chewed thoughtfully and swallowed again.

"Why?"

"I'm sorry?" Charlotte had been spreading her skirt out to dry the damp hem, but she stopped and looked up at this.

"Why d'ya love 'im?"

"Why d'ya love 'im?"

"I just…what kind of question is that?"

"It's just," another bite, "yer goin ta a lot a trouble fer someone who couldn't even be bothered to be here hisself. I just wanna know what it is 'bout him dat make youse so willing to do dis."

"Probably the same things that make you so willing to do the same," Charlotte answered tightly.

"Fair 'nough."

"Hey," Jinks swallowed and dropped the hand holding his half-eaten apple away from his mouth. "I didn' mean nothin by askin." He reached one hand out toward her but she twitched her shoulder away and he pulled back. "I'm real sorry, Doll."

"Don't call me that."

"Aw, c'mon now. Don' be like dat. It wasn't nothin."

"I love Spot, okay? I don't appreciate you questioning that."

"I didn' mean ta, alright? I'm sorry. It was outta line."

He wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and got up to feed the rest of his apple to the horse. Charlotte waited while he fed the horse the remainder of their water and made another trip back for more. When he returned, she'd packed everything back into the cart—brushing the grass off her blanket—and was seated on the bench waiting for him.


	11. Chapter 11

They rode until after dark. They had resumed chatting on and off throughout the day and neither had mentioned again the tense ending to their picnic. In the early evening, Jinks had lifted the reins off of his knees and passed them to Charlotte and had shown her how to drive the cart. She was the one who, when they were both too tired to go on, steered the horse off into the grass at the side of the path. Jinks complimented her style and watered the horse and tied him up for the night. Charlotte had reached behind them for the carpet bag on his instruction, and when he returned to help her down she passed it to him first and then accepted his hands around her waist, leaning heavily against his shoulders to step first on the large front wheel and then onto the ground.

"Ya ever build a fire?" he asked.

"No," she answered.

"Yer bout ta learn."

They fanned out together in the brush collecting sticks and dry leaves; Charlotte carried everything in the front of her skirt. Jinks showed her how to build a triangle with the sticks and light the base of it with a match. He produced a can of beans and, reaching into his back pocket, came back with a knife which he used to cut the top away. He settled the can carefully in the fire to heat, then wrapped it in his cap so they could pass it between them with a spoon. Charlotte didn't like the open as much after the sun had gone down. It was darker than she knew was possible and insects were constantly brushing against her exposed skin and there were sounds in the trees she couldn't name, which was unsettling.

"Can we leave the fire to burn?" she asked Jinks when they were preparing to sleep.

"Can't do dat. It might get jump ta da grass. Or might draw unwanted attention."

Charlotte stopped where she stood next to the cart with both hands hooked over the side to pull herself up. "You think Amato's following us?"

Jinks stopped close behind her. "Naw, just other travelers I'm thinkin of. Best to avoid anyone case they want what we got. Nothin ta worry bout, Doll." Then he lifted her up onto the bench and she climbed into the cart. She sat back and unlaced her boots and set them aside. Jinks had come around the other side and climbed in and was pulling his shirt off.

"Dis bother you?" he asked, catching Charlotte's eye.

"No. I mean, however you're most comfortable is fine."

He balled his shirt up under his head. Charlotte could feel the heat from his bare arm next to her. She passed the lighter sheet to him and tucked the blanket under her heels, pulling it up to her chin, glad there was something separating her from the darkness all around them. Jinks had put out the fire but it glowed dully and a line of smoke danced up into the black. She felt the cart creak on its axle as he shifted and when he spoke again she could tell he turned on his side to face her.

"I volunteered ta take ya," he said.

"To Philadelphia?"

"I convinced Spot it would be safer. I t'ought it should be me witcha."

She was quiet.

"I just wanted ya ta know dat I don't t'ink dis is a waste a my time or nothing."

"Alright. Noted."

They slept. Charlotte woke up before Jinks did, because she hadn't slept well on the stiff board beneath them and because she had been anxious all night about "other travelers" and the dark and Spot and Jinks a little, too. She could feel an intensity radiating off of him and it made her nervous. He was asleep with one arm tucked up under his cheek and the other clutched to his chest. The breath entering and exiting his body was slow and heavy. Charlotte sat up and stretched with effort and felt the bad nights of sleep in her lower back and in her shoulder blades. Jinks' boots were in line with hers, four shoes, two drastically different sizes, all huddled together ahead of them, the laces crossed over each other.

They split a hard loaf of bread as they pulled back onto the road. At noon, they stopped for water and to rest the horse but Jinks didn't offer anything to eat so Charlotte didn't ask. When they started again, Jinks said, "we'll be there by dinner," and Charlotte felt relieved and afraid. They pulled up as it was getting dark to a tall stone building that had white shutters on either side of each window which didn't go with the rest of the building. A sign over the door labeled it 'The Stenton' in a swirled script. Charlotte leaned her head back to see up to the top floors and guessed that it was 8 or 9 stories. She stayed with the horse and cart while Jinks went in and came back a while later with a key to their room.

A boy came out and led the horse around behind the building and Jinks had his carpet bag and Charlotte's pillowcase and she had the blankets balled up in her arms and they went in together.

A woman behind the desk smiled at them and nodded.

"Enjoy your stay, Mr. McCallum, Mrs. McCallum."

Charlotte looked back over her shoulder to see who had come in behind them and, when she saw that no one had, she realized the woman was still looking at them. She looked accusatorily at Jinks.

"Das us," he said.

"I'm picking up on that."

"Well it wouldn' a been very proper fer a young lady ta stay wid a young man she wadn't married to," he said defensively.

"No, you're right. It's okay," Charlotte assured him, but she wondered about the accommodations she'd find upstairs.

They climbed together to the fifth floor. Charlotte tried to hide her panting as they turned up flight after flight. She hadn't been out of her corset in days and her sides ached and it seemed her lungs might push through the skin.

"Ya alright, Doll?"

"Yes," she breathed.

"You gonna make it?"

"Nothing could keep me from a real bed."

Jinks laughed and shifted both bags to his one side and with the other hand he took her arm at the elbow and helped her the rest of the way to their room.

When he swung the door open for her, she stepped into a room half the size of her apartment. There was a queen bed with curtains hanging from the ceiling to enclose it, and a small chest at the foot. The open bathroom door showed a rusty tub and bucket and a mirror and basin. She noticed that the door couldn't be opened all the way because there was a rickety cot rolled in, crowding the already narrow room. She shot Jinks a look.

"Well I didn' t'ink you'd wanna share da bed wid me," he said with a smile, pushing past her to drop their things on the real bed dominating the room.

"What story did you give the desk about why we need an extra bed?"

Jinks grinned. "I told 'em ya snore," he answered. Charlotte laughed. She went to the bed and pulled the sheer curtains aside and sat down wearily. Jinks took his things and stowed them under the cot and threw himself back on it, ignoring the way it nearly collapsed on him.

Charlotte let herself fall back on her mattress as well and they breathed in the silence for a while.

"Ya want some dinner?" Jinks asked.

"I'm never leaving this room again," Charlotte answered.

"I'll bring something up," he laughed.

Charlotte agreed to let him bring something and when he somewhat unwillingly got to his feet again and went out, she took advantage of the opportunity and went into the bathroom. She untied her corset herself, something she had been growing less and less accustomed to, her fingers slipping now and then. Her sides heaved with relief at being free from it and she sat down hard on the floor with her blouse and underthings in a pile on the floor at her feet, sat with her back against the bathroom door and breathed painfully. There was a stabbing pain on her right side like a knife between her ribs when she breathed in and she wrapped the opposite arm around to hold herself together. Charlotte rested her head back on the door and closed her eyes.

By the time Jinks had returned, she'd redressed, packed her corset in her bag, and was stretched out on the sagging bed.

It was dark by that time but she hadn't moved to light the lamp and when he opened the door and light from the hall flooded in, he hesitated in the doorway a moment before stepping in quietly with a covered plate in his hand.

"I'm awake," Charlotte announced, "and hungry."

He moved more confidently then and set the plate down on his cot to light the lamp in the room and when it sprang up he passed the plate over to her, still warm, covered in a checkered cloth. He'd found a diner and brought her fried chicken, German potato salad, barbeque baked beans, a tough roll, and limp green beans. It was a feast. Charlotte ate hungrily on her bed and couldn't remember the last time she'd eaten such a meal. When she'd finished she climbed down and put the plate—covered again—out in the hall to be taken away. Jinks was asleep in his boots. He hadn't undressed at all, just draped himself over the feeble cot and was snoring lightly in a way that felt comfortable and familiar. Charlotte pulled back the quilt covering her bed and crawled between the welcome sheets curled on her side toward the door, and dropped into sleep after him.

For the next five days they slept in this arrangement and ate like kings at the diner. Jinks sold the horse and cart off on their second day and treated her to dessert after their dinner that night. Both of them must have known that they wouldn't be able to live that way forever, but neither of them said anything or adjusted their meals. Jinks did some repair work for the hotel and they came into a little more money that way. He was gone often during the day and returned sometime in the late afternoon for dinner. Charlotte wandered down to the front desk early on and asked them to mail the bakery key back to the Symanskis and felt a little better for disappearing on them without so much as a word. She knew they'd fill the coveted position quickly if only Alana could bring herself to be satisfied with the purity of one of the applicants.

Charlotte was restless in their small room and wandered the streets sometimes or walked out on the grassy lawn behind the hotel and thought about Spot. She was decidedly eager for him to meet them now. She didn't care about what had happened but just wanted to see him and smell him and feel him and for everything to be eager and frenzied and thrilling like it had been the first few years of their relationship. They were lucky. They'd been able to cling to those fillings longer than most. She was not unaware that their relationship likely had been so exciting because it was secret and furtive, but she didn't make much more of this fact than to acknowledge it.

On a late afternoon, after 3:00, Charlotte met Jinks in their diner at their table and she ordered water and meatloaf and mashed potatoes and green beans and a roll and he ordered root beer and a pasta dish in a creamy sauce with sausage. He'd found work running correspondence for a local bank and said he liked the work—the ease of it and that he could be outside. He thought in another couple of weeks that he might be liked enough recommend Charlotte be hired on. He hadn't stopped calling her "Doll" or letting his eyes glitter over her since they'd started settling in, and if anything was growing more emboldened. Charlotte, for her part, had taken to leaning on his arm when they walked together and waiting up for him if he worked late. It felt like they were the only two people in all of Philadelphia and that everyone else was just decoration. But still, every day was like they were waiting for something. She wasn't sure what—for Spot to arrive? For Amato to catch up to them? Jinks had assured her there was no way he would, but then why was she holding her breath all the time and checking out the window?

Her answer walked through the door as she was using a knife to press two green beans onto her fork. The bell that usually twinkled when the door was opened coughed out a strangled alarm as the door was shoved in too forcefully and a stranger to the town walked in. He spotted Charlotte and Jinks immediately and made his way to them, limping slightly as he wove between the tables—some occupied, some not—and scuffed to a stop next to them. Charlotte stopped with the fork halfway to her mouth. Jinks was sitting against the back of his chair chewing and he did not stop doing so. If he was startled, he did not show it. Charlotte did. She lowered the uneaten mouthful slowly back down to the plate and looked up at the stranger towering over the table. He wore an old, limp suit over a stained shirt and there was a bowler hat low on his head. Charlotte didn't recognize him but she knew immediately, instinctively, who he was.

"Amato sends his regards," he said in a voice much thinner than she'd been expecting.

Jinks stood up, the chair scraping out behind him, and was every inch as tall as the stranger. He faced him and glowered at him.

"You've interrupted da lady's dinner," he said. "It's time ta go."

"It is," the stranger agreed. He nodded out to the street where two more thugs waited. "Time fer all of us ta leave. A big happy family."

The stranger reached over to Charlotte and pulled her to her feet, but Jinks shoved him back with two hard hands flat on his chest and reached for her hand and led her out of the diner. His hand was tight around hers. She tried to ask what they were going to do but he didn't answer.


	12. Chapter 12

After being escorted from the diner and to the hotel to collect their things, Charlotte, Jinks, and their personal goon squad took the train back to Brooklyn. Despite having been nervous on the initial trip—not knowing Jinks, worrying about Spot, the uncertainty surrounding Philadelphia—the return trip was infinitely more nerve-wracking. Jinks became more like Spot than Charlotte would've thought possible. He didn't speak to her for the duration of the trip, which was nearly five hours, and his face was completely devoid of emotion, hardened into a mask the minute she'd been pulled to her feet in the diner. They had their own car on the train. She and Jinks were made to sit farthest from the doors, under the window, each seated next to an escort with the third standing outside the door. Charlotte kept trying to catch Jink's eye but he refused to look at her. When they returned to the Brooklyn station, they were loaded into a covered carriage and driven straight to Amato's mansion.

They had caught the last train to Brooklyn that day and it was after 9pm. Charlotte was exhausted. Every muscle in her body screamed from being coiled for hours on end and she was fighting to keep the bile from rising up into her throat. She'd already thrown up on the train.

When they walked through the front door, Jinks was immediately separated from her and taken off down a hall by two of the men, while the third prodded her forward into the heart of the house. She called after Jinks but he didn't even flinch at the sound of her voice. Whatever was going to happen to him, he seemed resigned to it. She was escorted into a small, internal office—plush and thickly furnished just as what parts of the house she'd seen on her first visit there. The door closed behind her and she was alone. She lowered her belongings down onto the floor beside her and remained hovering just in the doorway, shifting from one foot to the other. She glanced around at the floor-length curtains, the floor-to-ceiling book shelves lined with books, the heavy wooden desk in the middle of the room, completely bare on top aside from a single lamp. The desk was so well polished she could see her own reflection in it. It was twisted in terror.

There was some commotion in the hall and she spun to face the door, stepping further into the room, but it quickly died down and was quiet again. Then, behind her, a door disguised as a bookshelf swept aside and Amato stepped in, looking smug. Charlotte froze and watched him breeze up to her, grasp her arms tightly and kiss her on both cheeks with a wet smack. He smelled like stale liquor and cigar smoke and something else, something metallic. When he stepped back from her and she was able to see his scuffed knuckles, she realized the smell was blood.

She felt the color drain from her face and was forced to lunge forward to grip the edge of the desk for support as her stomach churned and she threw up for the second time that day, in the middle of a thick carpet.

"Oh no, you're not sick?" Amato said grandly, reaching into his pocket for a handkerchief which he handed her to wipe her mouth with. He rang a little bell and a maid came in and rolled up the entire rug and took it out of the room. Amato extended an arm to Charlotte and led her around the huge desk to the chair behind it, settling her in it.

"You've had a traumatic day, I'm sure, and I'm sorry for that," he was saying, returning to the other side of the desk where he leaned against it lazily. "But some information came to my attention, you see, some information that made me very unhappy."

Charlotte held the handkerchief to her face and breathed deeply, tasting the burning vomit in her mouth. She pressed her eyes shut.

"Let me tell you a story," Amato continued, without paying her any real attention. She was his captive audience and he was in fine form. "I think you'll find it very interesting. There's a king, you see, and he controls all the kingdom. He's quite wealthy and quite powerful, but he is a fair and just ruler loved by his subjects. We are, of course, talking about me. He employed a knight, young and handsome and charming and very good at trading in information. Now, of course, I'm talking about your lover, Mr. Conlon."

Only when he came to the word 'lover' did Amato's tone change, tightening around the word and spitting it out like it tasted bad to him. Charlotte still didn't open her eyes. She stared into the maroon darkness behind her closed lids and listened to Amato's voice drifting around her and tasted the vomit in her mouth and felt the heat in her cheeks and the cotton handkerchief sucking into her nostrils when she inhaled and brushing her cheek when she exhaled and she prayed, prayed fervently, over and over again like a mantra, that Spot was alive and that she could live through this, too.

Amato went on.

"This knight was quite the promising up-and-comer, and the king had high hopes for him. Aside from being skilled and useful, he was a friend, and the king trusted him. He gave him a purpose in life and compensated him well, and he only asked one thing in return: No. Secrets." Amato's voice was suddenly loud in her ear and his breath was on her neck. Charlotte's eyes snapped open and he was beside her, his nose brushing her face as he hissed into her ear.

"The knight broke that rule. He lied to the king and he stole from the king and he thought the king would be too stupid to know, thought he was untouchable but _he was wrong._ Oh, was he wrong."

Amato's silky smile was gone, as was his easy charm. His jaw was tight and his hands were clenched into fists. He spun Charlotte's chair to face him, planting his hands on either side of her, blocking her against the back of the chair with his body.

"You and Mr. Conlon have a similar flaw of character. After everything the Symanski's have done for you, the life they've provided for you, you repay them by sleeping around, profaning their hard-earned business with your shameless sex, and then you run away, leaving them high and dry?"

Charlotte's whole body was shaking. He knew about the Symanskis. He knew everything about her. He had known everything, the whole time. He had just been waiting for Spot to tell him about their relationship. His anger had been building for months.

"They led me right to you," Amato sneered. "Sweet Mr. and Mrs. Symanski, hurt and betrayed, when I asked them where you were they told me everything they knew. You thought you could make up for everything you've put them through by mailing a key?"

The key. The envelope would have shown where it was sent from. Her stupidity had landed them here.

"Where's Spot?" She whispered. She didn't dare look at Amato but she was so scared for Spot she couldn't help asking. There was a sense of dread mounting in her chest and she needed to know. Louis Amato cracked his palm across her cheek with a flash of his red velvet smoking jacket. Charlotte gasped and her hand flew up to her smarting skin.

"Spot," Amato spit in her face. "Precious Spot. You don't deserve to know where he is. _He_ doesn't deserve to know where he is. He doesn't deserve to know his own name."

"He was only trying to protect me," Charlotte stammered desperately. "Please, it was no disrespect to you, I know it."

Amato scoffed. "No disrespect to me? No disrespect to me? After _everything_ I did for him, the unrateful swine, he _stole_ from me. Took what was mine."

Charlotte's brow furrowed and she tiled her head stiffly.

"What do you mean? He...he...stole? From you?" Suddenly something clicked in her mind. Spot's behavior the past few months hadn't made any sense in terms of her, but if he'd been covering for something else, something more serious, then maybe it did.

"Seems your expensive taste was a little too much for Spot to keep up with," Amato was saying. "Seems he didn't think his compensation from me was generous enough. It seems," Amato was pacing in front of the desk, the arm nearest her twitching in the air like he wanted to hit her again. "that Spot needed to steal money from me to keep you satisfied."

"No," Charlotte choked, shaking her head. "It must be a mistake. That can't be true."

"It _is_ true. He's been stealing from _me_ to pay your rent." Amato slammed his palms down flat on the desk opposite her.

Charlotte began to sob. Years of memories fell into place like a puzzle she'd been looking at all long. Affording an apartment as a single woman, even one as sparse as hers, was impossible, unheard of. But when Spot had given her a chance out of the group home, she'd never thought to question it. She'd never wondered how he was able to give her something so extravagant. If she'd been more practical, less selfish, she might be lying in Spot's arms at that very moment, not looking at knuckles stained in his blood.

"He was trying to protect me," Charlotte wailed, her body shaking with deep, wracking breaths. "Please, this is my fault."

Something about her tears seemed to soothe Amato, who straightened his jacket and slicked back his hair and stood calmly in front of her.

When he spoke again, his voice was low, almost difficult to hear over her own sobs.

"Here," Amato said, "is to you and yours, and to mine and ours. And if mine and ours ever come across to you and yours, I hope you and yours will do as much for mine and ours as mine and ours have done for you and yours."

"What?" Charlotte sniffed, running the back of her hand across her eyes.

"It means," Amato said, opening the door she had come in, "that you owe me."

 **A/N: Big confrontation that I know many of you have been waiting for-** **I hope it didn't disappoint! I know Spot has been missing for a long time, too long in many opinions, but I promise he will be back soon! Please read, favorite, request and review! And if you feel like it, check out my other recent fics: _Alice, Angel_ is another ongoing Spot fic, and _Salute to the Serpents_ is a completed Riverdale fic. **


	13. Chapter 13

"Here," Amato said, "is to you and yours, and to mine and ours. And if mine and ours ever come across to you and yours, I hope you and yours will do as much for mine and ours as mine and ours have done for you and yours."

"What?" Charlotte sniffed, running the back of her hand across her eyes.

"It means," Amato said, opening the door she had come in, "that you owe me."

…

Spot was standing in the hallway on the other side of the opened door. Charlotte let out a ragged, choking sob and ducked her head, unable to look at his dark and swollen face, the way he seemed to favor his right side. He walked carefully into the room, breathing heavily. Amato put an arm around his shoulder and gave him a squeeze, which resulted in a sharp intake of breath from Spot, who winced in pain.

"We've been catching up," Amato said, gesturing to Charlotte. "Seems she was just as in the dark as I was."

Spot looked up at her and he was shaking his head, his eyes so apologetic, so sincere, totally defeated.

"Char," he began, reaching out toward her, but Amato cut him off.

"You owe me a debt," he continued, ignoring their eyes pleading for each other. Charlotte wiped her wet face with the back of her hand and let her eyes trail over Spot, his shirt hanging open, stained with blood, his head drooping, hair swinging forward where he didn't have the strength to push it away.

"Because you took the money and because you benefited from the money, the debt belongs to both of you," Amato said.

"No," Spot said through a tight jaw, wincing. "Dis was all me. She 'ad nothin ta do wid it."

"That's not the way I see it."

"Amato, please," Spot begged. Charlotte couldn't remember ever having heard him say that before. She had never seen him like this.

"Calm down, friend," Amato soothed, "don't you worry. I'm certain we can come to an arrangement."

He helped Spot into the chair opposite Charlotte and she darted her hand across the desk for his, straining for him, but he didn't reach back. He shook his head sharply and looked up at Amato.

"I'll let 'er go," he said firmly. "If dat's what you want, I'll never see 'er again."

"The hell you won't," Charlotte bit back.

"No, no, I don't have any intention of separating the two of you," Amato answered, dismissing the suggestion with a wave of his hand. "Quite the opposite, actually." He looked down at Charlotte and smiled his charming smile. "You're going to work for me."

"What?" she asked.

"No," Spot insisted at the same time.

"Oh, yes. It's the perfect solution. Spot will remain my employee, though with many fewer privileges, of course, and Charlotte will work in my house. You have experience baking. I'm sure Mrs. Cane can make use of you in the kitchen. You will both work for me until every penny Spot stole is repaid."

"Amato," Spot planted a hand on the desk and pushed himself to his feet weakly. "I can pay it off. I'll woik as long as I 'ave to. Charlotte don't need to be here."

"She's going to stay, Spot. There's no way out of that. But look at the bright side—she gets a new job and you both get to be together! I'll even let her move into your room so that we can keep a good eye on the two of you. I insist, Mr. Conlon."

Spot's mouth was a hard line. He took a step toward Amato, the hand nearest to Charlotte clenching and unclenching. She scrambled to her feet and reached out to take his hand before he could do anything else.

"We'll do what you want," she said, staring into Spot's eyes. He was shaking his head. "I'll work for you. We'll pay back the money."

"Excellent!" Amato rang the little bell again and a different maid appeared.

"Take Ms. Charlotte's things up to Spot's room," he ordered. "Charlotte, I'm sure Mr. Conlon will be happy to direct you to your new quarters."

He took Spot's hand in his like they were shaking hands, but held it firmly. "I trust this will be the last of our issues, Mr. Conlon," he said lowly. "Your rent will be due, as always, at the end of the month."

He waited for the maid to leave the room with Charlotte's things, and then followed her out, pulling the door closed behind them. The minute it was shut, Spot collapsed into the chair behind him.

"Spot," Charlotte kneeled in front of him but was afraid to touch him for fear of hurting him.

"I'm so sorry, Angel," he said gruffly. "I never shoulda let dis happen. I fucked up so bad an I'm so sorry. I kin get you outta dis. I can hide you away again, I know I can."

"No," she whispered. She leaned up to press her forehead to his. "I'm staying. Doesn't this seem like what we've always wanted? Everyone knows about us now. No secrets, no hiding. And we get to be together. He's letting me stay with you. Why would I want to leave that?"

"You don't understand him. He's not a good guy, Doll, I can't let you stay 'ere."

"You can't make me leave," she said. "I'm so glad you're okay. I didn't know what to think."

"I mean, I been better," Spot grinned, then winced. "Shit. Dis gonna take months ta heal."

"But I can take care of you."

Spot lowered himself onto the floor in front of her with great effort, stretched his legs out on either side of her and pulled her into his chest. Charlotte exhaled and felt like she was breathing normally for the first time since she'd last seen him. She closed her eyes and breathed him in, pressing her face into his neck. They were quiet for a moment.

"I can't be around all da time," Spot said finally.

"What?"

"I still got a job ta do. I can't just be wid ya all day."

"Okay."

"I'm just sayin…don' get yer hopes up."

Charlotte's heart fell. He was putting up walls. He was letting her down easy before they'd even tried. After everything that had happened. He was still pulling back.

"I'm not asking you to marry me, Spot," she said lowly. She pushed back and stood up, then reached down to help him to his feet. She looked away from him.

"I'm glad yer alright," he said. That was his way of apologizing. That's how he tried to placate her into feeling like he cared.

"You too," she answered.

He took her hand and led her to the door.

"Lemme show you our room," he said.

 **A/N: What do we think? Can Spot actually be a good boyfriend for once? I really want him to be, but I'm just not sure he has it in him with Charlotte. We shall see! As always, please read, favorite, request and review!**


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